CIVIL DISCOURSE ON CIVIL UNIONS: John Corvino

...I'm the first to admit that I could be wrong in the strategy I proposed for securing equal marriage rights. But if you're going to attack that strategy, please try first to understand it. In brief, I argued that:
(1) Properly crafted civil-unions legislation could grant ALL of the legal incidents of marriage (albeit under a different name). I am not talking about "watered-down" civil unions here; I'm talking about the full legal enchilada.
(2) The difference between such unions and marriage, since it is not a difference in legal incidents, appears to be a difference in level of social endorsement carried by the "m-word."
(3) Our best strategy (in most states) for securing the tremendously important legal incidents is to fight for them under the name "civil unions."
(4) Our best strategy for securing the social endorsement (i.e., marriage under the name "marriage") is first to secure the legal incidents. Then people will look at our civil unions, realize that they are virtually indistinguishable from marriages, start calling them marriages, and gradually forget why they objected to doing so before. That's what happened in Scandinavia, and it's happening elsewhere in Europe.
(5) Attempts to force the social endorsement too quickly (by demanding the name "marriage" above and beyond the legal incidents) may backfire, resulting in state constitutional bans not only on gay marriage but also on civil unions. The upshot would be to delay BOTH the legal incidents and the social endorsement.

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posted by Eve at 7:40 PM VOTE

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